German connections with the Syrian secret services and its repressive regime go back in history: after the Second World War, Nazi officers from the Wehrmacht army and the Schutzstaffel (SS) paramilitary evaded German and international justice and fled to Syria. Among them was Alois Brunner, who, under Adolf Eichmann, was jointly responsible for the deportation and murder of six million European Jews and who lived in Syria under a false name from 1954 onwards, later working as an adviser to the Syrian secret services.

From the mid-1960s onwards, the Socialist Unity Party (SED) leadership in the German Democratic Republic (GDR) began to intensify relations with Syria. The GDR supported Syria by supplying weapons and surveillance technology, while the Staatssicherheit (State Security), also known as the Stasi, trained the “political police” in Syria. These connections are often described as having deeply shaped the structure of Syria’s security architecture. 

The event is part of the current exhibition “SEDNAYA. The Architecture of Repression and Death in Syria” and will shed light on these German connections and links based on the research findings of two academics. Dr. Noura Chalati (Berlin) and Thora Pindus (University of Marburg) will provide insights into their work on the connections and intermediaries involved in dynamics ranging from the support of fugitive Nazis, the establishment of the Syrian security apparatus, to the cooperation between the Stasi and the Syrian secret services, and will re-evaluate certain dominant narratives around these developments. Dr. Elke Stadelmann-Wenz (Head of Research at the Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Memorial) will chair this event.

The event is being held in cooperation with the MENA Prison Forum, medico international, the Prisons Museum, the Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient, and the Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Memorial. The event will be held in German, with simultaneous interpretation into Arabic.

Registration via the Kontaktformular or via [email protected]